Eli Cohen

Eliyahu Ben-Shaul "Eli" Cohen (6 December 1924-18 May 1965), also known as Kamel Amin Thaabet, was an Egyptian-Jewish Israeli Mossad agent who infiltrated the Syrian government from 1961 to 1965, becoming the chief adviser to the Ministry of Defense in the process. He helped to sabotage the Syrian Arab Army's Golan Heights defenses (which would lead to the Israeli victory in the 1967 Six-Day War), but he was caught and executed in 1965.

Early life
Eliyahu Ben-Shaul Cohen was born in Alexandria, Egypt on 6 December 1924 to a Zionist Syrian-Jewish family which was originally from Aleppo. In January 1947, he enlisted in the Egyptian Army rather than pay the same fee that all other draft-exempted Jewish young men were supposed to pay. However, he was declared ineligible for service and was harassed by the Muslim Brotherhood, and his parents and three brothers emigrated to Israel in 1949. In 1951, the new government of Egypt imprisoned Cohen for his Zionist activities, and he took part in Israeli efforts to smuggle Jewish refugees out of the country during the 1950s. In December 1956, he emigrated to Israel, and he briefly served in the IDF counter-intelligence before resigning after Mossad twice rejected his application. He worked as an insurance office filing clerk for two years and married the Iraqi-Jewish immigrant Nadia Majald, settling in Bat Yam. Cohen never felt welcome among the Israelis, who saw him as an Arab immigrant and not an Israeli Jew.

Start with Mossad
In 1959, the Israeli diplomat Jacob Shimoni had Mossad agent Dan Peleg recruit a spy to infiltrate the Syrian government after the Syrian military shelled the kibbutz of Ein Gev. Peleg left a letter on Cohen's desk at his job and told him to show up to an address on Allenby Street, purposely leaving the wrong address. Cohen was initially confounded upon his arrival at the address, but he eventually discovered that Shimoni and Peleg were watching him from a nearby building, and he entered that building instead. Peleg and Shimoni asked him if he considered himself a patriot, and if he would be willing to die for his country or lie to his friends and family for his country, and Cohen confirmed his commitments. He was then taken in by Peleg for several months of training, learning to identify key Syrian officials, types of Soviet-made Syrian weaponry and vehicles, to identify spies in a large crowd of people, and other skills. While Peleg warned him that his mission meant that he would have to be separated from his family for a long time, Cohen agreed to the mission, and he told his wife that he had finally been employed by Mossad, although he told her that he was instead being asked to serve as an equipment buyer instead of a spy. In 1961, Cohen was sent to Geneva, Switzerland, where another Israeli agent, Salinger, gave him the identity "Kamel Amin Thaabet", a Syrian businessman who was the son of Amin Thaabet and Saida Abrahim, Syrian parents who moved from Damascus to Beirut for work and gave birth to him there in 1915.

Buenos Aires
Cohen was then sent to Buenos Aires, Argentina, the center of the Arab expatriate community, under the pretense that his father owned a large textile factory on 74 Legazzi Street and that he had inherited the highly successful company after his father died. Cohen became active in Arab social circles at the Club Damasco and other venues, and he worked with fellow spy Julia Schneider to make his way into more influential circles, which led him to meet the Syrian general Amin al-Hafiz. He met al-Hafiz and his head of security Ahmed Suidani at an embassy party, where al-Hafiz's wife felt up Cohen as he introduced himself to her husband. He befriended al-Hafiz, who verified his identity after Cohen told him the causes of death of his parents and the location of their burial sites. Cohen stole a photographer's camera to provide Mossad with images for several of the Syrian people-of-interest on file, and he also looked over several classified documents before avoiding Suidani, who had been sent to inspect the embassy and ensure that the files were safe. Cohen later left to meet up with Schneider at La Paz, but Suidani's security guard followed Cohen after hearing that a camera had been stolen. He chased him to the park, where he observed Cohen handing over the photos to Schneider. The two Israeli spies then pursued the agent to an apartment block, where the agent fell to his death into the courtyard after a scuffle with the two agents.

Schneider panicked, and she informed Cohen that he had to abandon his plans to travel to Syria to continue his mission, instead advising him to continue going to Club Damasco. However, Cohen refused, saying that he could avoid suspicion by heading back to the embassy the next day to bring gifts to al-Hafiz and ask for a letter of recommendation. Sure enough, Cohen drove to the embassy and was escorted to al-Hafiz by Suidani, and he bribed al-Hafiz with a winter coat for his wife and a golden watch for him. He then informed al-Hafiz that their previous conversation had made him elated, and that he intended to speed up his plans to travel to Damascus with the help of a letter from Latif. Just then, al-Hafiz gleefully offered to write his own letter of recommendation to Cohen, and Cohen assured al-Hafiz that, when the time came for al-Hafiz to rise in the ranks, Cohen would provide financial support to him. al-Hafiz thanked him, and told him that he had the rare quality of loyalty.

Cohen then returned to the Zurich safehouse, where Salinger and his wife informed Cohen that his wife had given birth, giving him a doll and other gifts to bring to his family. Cohen was allowed to return to Israel to visit his wife and daughter, and he then met up with Peleg, giving him a status update. Peleg was happy about Cohen's theft of the camera bag, which was not part of the plan, but which helped the Israelis; he complimented Cohen's instincts and his judgement. While Cohen said that he wanted to remain at home with his newborn daughter and that he was guilty about the Syrian agent's death, Peleg told him that he was saving lives and not taking them.

Cohen then returned to the Zurich safehouse, where he was provided with soap-shaped explosive devices in case he needed them. He was then sent to meet with the Syrian businessman Majed Sheikh al-Ard aboard a yacht bound for Beirut, as Cohen's solo entry into Syria would be suspicious. Cohen met with al-Ard in the dining cabin after inviting him to share a bottle of '45 Mouton Rothschild with him, and, after they introduced each other, Cohen attempted to make conversation by asking his opinion on the chances of a Ba'athist takeover in the aftermath of the fall of the Nasserist United Arab Republic. al-Ard warned him that, while he may have been able to openly discuss politics in Argentina, his public discussion of politics might get him killed in Syria; he then abruptly told Cohen that he was tired and had to sleep. Cohen attempted to speak with al-Ard later that night at his room, offering him a ride from Beirut to Damascus as a peace offering. However, al-Ard politely declined. When the ship arrived in Beirut, Cohen caught al-Ard as he offloaded his Peugeot car, and Cohen complimented the car and expressed his knowledge about the rare vehicle; al-Ard bragged that he was only the seventh person to own it. Before Cohen could bid farewell to al-Ard, al-Ard invited Cohen to ride with him to Damascus, lest his ride be dull; Cohen decided to accompany him. He was introduced to Syrian customs officer Abu Khaldon at the border, and he bribed him with a gold pocket watch before convincing him not to search the trunk of his car, claiming that he had extremely graphic pornography in the back due to his sexual needs as a single man. Cohn then told al-Ard this same excuse, alleviating his concerns and causing him to laugh.

The two men then drove into the Abu Rummaneh neighborhood of Damascus, where Cohen moved into a luxurious apartment across from the Second Bureau military headquarters on Moussa Ibn Nousser Street. He then sent a Morse signal back to the Mossad headquarters informing them that he had found an apartment; instead of waiting eight weeks to speak with Mossad as instructed, he decided to update them after two weeks. Cohen then purchased all of the tables in Abou Mahmoud's shop so that he could store them at the new warehouse for his front company, Thaabeth Import-Export. Cohen sent valuable photographs and newspaper information to Israel through his import-export company, hiding messages in pottery or in table legs. Over the next four months, he became a leading member of Damascus' business community.